Each year, hundred of thousands of baggages are lost in airports throughout the world. These losts cause tens of millions of dollars worth to the airlines in reimbursements, searching fees, storing, and rerouting.
There exists an international database for lost baggages: the SITA database, which is shared by about half the airlines. However, this database only contributes to retracing already lost baggages and does not prevent their losts.
The well-known Sep. 11, 2001 events have shown the tremendous need for increasing security in airport regarding people movement in specific zone.
The increasing competition among airlines, the difficulty for airlines to keep their market share, in addition to the fact that their clients are more demanding than ever result in the introduction of new systems for tracking baggages.
For example, Watanabe et al. in the U.S. Pat. No. 5,478,991, issued on Dec. 26, 1995 and entitled “Aircraft Baggage Managing System Utilizing A Response Circuit Provided On A Baggage Tag” describe an example of such systems. Watanabe et al. teach a wireless baggage tracking system including electronic tags configured so as to transmit a radio signal, a reader disposed at a classification point of the baggage to transmit a question electromagnetic wave to the tag and to receive a response thereto, and a computer for inputting and storing baggage information read on the tags.
A first drawback of Watanabe's system is that it only allows detecting baggage at specific places along a baggage belt conveyor and not at any place in the airport. Moreover, a relatively long delay may occur between the time a baggage is actually lost and the moment the system detects the lost. Another drawback is that Watanabe's system does not allow any means to retrace a lost baggage. A further drawback is that it does not provide any means to manage the tags.
The U.S. Pat. No. 6,333,690, issued to Nelson et al. on Dec. 25, 2001 and entitled “Wide Area Multipurpose Tracking System” describes a system for electronically tracking and locating objects. The system includes a tag for sending a coded signal to a network of receiver base stations with limited but overlapping reception ranges. Each receiver base station places in its own memory the time at which a record enters its range, remains in range, and the time at which it leaves.
Nelson's system shares common drawbacks with Watanabe's such as the fact that it does not allow a precision beyond the range of the receiver, yielding a relatively long delay between the time a baggage is actually lost and the moment the system detects the lost. It does not allow any means to retrace a lost baggage, and it does not provide any means to manage the tags.
An improved wide area object and large capacity tracking system is therefore desired.